"That man is an artist," Wendell B. Harris once said to me, of film critic Armond White. I was trying to set up an interview with Harris about his long-neglected film Chameleon Street, the 1990 Sundance Grand Prize winner that should have led to a brilliant career. The film, and Harris, virtually disappeared in the 1990's, his brief appearances in Out of Sight and Road Trip notwithstanding. Critics mostly saw in Chameleon Streeta colorful but fumbling amateur effort. White saw a masterpiece, championing the film in the Film Comment essay "Underground Man" and referring to it as a measure of artistry in other reviews. So perhaps Harris had self-serving reasons for calling a mere film critic an artist—one hand washing the other. I would be inclined to agree if I didn't see what White saw in Chameleon Street (basically, a low-budget peer to Orson Welles) or what Harris sees in White (a film critic as influential as his mentors, Pauline Kael and Andrew Sarris). Armond White counts as an artist to me because his best work carries the power of art. It teaches audiences and artists how to see, feel and imagine more deeply.

Of course, anyone familiar with White's column in the NY Press (and the hate mail it regularly generates) knows that he is more often described as stone crazy. Or, "batshit crazy." Or simply, "insane." Just as often, exasperated readers and colleagues refer to him as "contrarian for the sake of being contrary." He does position himself in diametric opposition to virtually every film critic on earth. But does that make him crazy? A rebel for the hell of it? No: The best White writings agitate, scold, flail, balk, intimidate, insult and weep for the state of the world. But they're not an act. They give movies and pop culture a messy, personal reaction. (Hence this messy, personal appreciation.) Though he writes in a kind of crisp, omniscient-sounding voice, White's work expresses heartbreak at most folk's refusal to make/let culture enter their hearts/minds and change their lives/worlds. He's a grandiose dude.

Here are ten fragments from White's writing that I've wanted to frame and hang on a wall—and which make him count as something greater than a successor to Kael and Sarris. Sarris imported and bottled French auteurism for American cineastes. Kael humanized film criticism and brought filmmakers down to earth while proselytizing movie love. Both changed Eurocentric film culture irrevocably. White is out to change the world. Embedded in his reviews are the means to topple Ho'wood hegemony and the critical orthodoxy that keeps audiences expecting so little of movies these days. That's crazy. That's art.

10.

"The problem for all of us is developing a less egocentric response to cinema. The transference of identity that people of color have always had to make at the movies is just the kind of theoretical, hypothetical leap of faith, pledge of fellow feeling that Hollywood filmmakers now refuse to return." ("Hollywood Burning," The City Sun, March 8, 1989.)

White is responding here to Mississippi Burning, a film about the notorious Schwerner-Goodman-Chaney Civil Rights massacre told from the perspective of two righteous white FBI agents. In one paragraph he elucidates the central heartbreak of Black moviegoers that James Baldwin tried to pin down in his book The Devil Finds Work: For Ho'wood, Black folks are a burden and a marginal presence in even their own true stories. The makers of Bulworth, The Constant Gardener, Last King of Scotland, Freedomland and Blood Diamonds should have consulted this review. Writer-director Craig Brewer (Hustle & Flow, Black Snake Moan) seems to conceive his projects with White's admonition in mind, but with a warped sense of "Black" morality jamming the works.

9.

"Suppose the original Shaft, Richard Roundtree (who has gained gravity and skill he didn't have back in 1971, but here is relegated to a smiling old-codger cameo), had reprised Shaft and brought with him some reflection on the past 30 years of racism, police brutality, ghetto nihilism? Paul Newman captured such depth in reprised roles of The Drowning Pool and Twilight. But Hollywood doesn't allow black artists to create such continuity and exploration. Jackson takes over the Shaft franchise simply to deracinate and dilute it." ("Shaft," NY Press, July 12, 2000.)

This is one of many White observations that I would like to force-feed Spike Lee, John Singleton, Craig Brewer, Quentin Tarantino—any filmmaker recycling blaxploitation and other "trash" genres. Why reach into the past only for style and attitude when there are riches of pop culture/social wisdom to be reaped? But there's a more practical lesson here, too. Ho'wood routinely botches remakes, sequels and adaptations by a literal-minded focus on recycling "proven" formulas. That's why, instead of an Alien sequel that follows the indelible Ripley character on some other adventure that doesn't necessarily involve aliens, or one that features the creatures menacing some other plausible, interesting set of characters, Ho'wood forces both elements together across an increasingly ludicrous run of sequels (the great, gorgeous Alien 3 notwithstanding). Instead of trusting that we'd enjoy watching the loveable Rocky Balboa in an expansion upon the original Rocky's Philly neorealism, Stallone forces the old man back in the ring. White's coulda-shoulda scenarios provoke my own, and show up the stingy imagination and social vision in contemporary mainstream films.

8.

"Nothing has changed in [Spike] Lee's work since Stanley Crouch, in The Village Voice, notoriously branded him an "Afro-fascist" except now, in Bamboozled, Lee's hectoring has joined Crouch's conservative view, ridiculing and lambasting the wayward actions of pop-culture magpies, rappers, actors, liberal-activists. All the 'controversy' that attends each Spike Lee film works against any radical or progressive effect they might have. Get on the Bus, Summer of Sam, Bamboozled are all easily slotted (and forgotten) as big-budget agit-pop-movies regularly praised by The New York Times assuredly don't agitate anyone. The way the media and academia join Lee's annual bandwagons prevent notice of any less media-canny artist from affecting public discussion. And this is the degenerating effect of money and power: to preserve the status quo, to keep racial and political discussion in the control of the major studios and media outlets." (Cineaste, March, 2001.)

Six years later, the ascendancy of cynical entrepreneur-artists like Jay-Z confirms this view of a media approval system that excludes true Black visionaries. Even hip hop mavericks like Kanye West, Common and Mos Def wind up as commercial pitchmen or sidekicks in Ho'wood films. (Kanye's nervousness while muttering the plain truth about George Bush on live TV said it all. He probably sensed millions of dollars flying out of his pockets.) Six years later, and 30 years after filmmakers like Bill Gunn and Charles Burnett seemed to augur an African-American New Wave comparable to the white one, there's no such thing. Through the decades, Altman, Coppola, Scorsese and the gang enjoyed a critical and commercial response equal to their stature. Their Black counterparts are still off in the margins, dismissed, forgotten. It's nice that Killer of Sheep had a successful resurrection this year, but Norbit nihilism rules the day.

7.

"Everyone's estimation of A.I. will depend on their interest in childhood mythology. Will they accept that Spielberg–from The Sugarland Express to The Color Purple, from Hook to Amistad—is the one filmmaker to sustain the link between fantasy and moral reckoning? Start with the film's audacious ad copy ("His love is real. But he is not"). It sets A.I. apart from Hollywood's mostly antipathetic films. Rather than indulging religiosity, as Spielberg's antireligious detractors charge, the movie phases into and through religious parallels toward a spiritual essence. Every image (whether a deceptive heavenly orb or Gigolo Joe's facial planes resembling David Bowie's trompe l'oeil makeup in the Blue Jean video) forces us to question the authenticity of things and feelings. Each part of David's journey through carnal and sexual universes into the final eschatological devastation becomes as profoundly philosophical and contemplative as anything by cinema's most thoughtful, speculative artists—Borzage, Ozu, Demy, Tarkovsky. So what if the project came via Kubrick? That's both a red herring and good fortune. Moments that Kubrick would have made cold and ugly are surpassed by Spielberg's richer truth—and that's as it should be. It's Spielberg's distinct sensibility that makes the difference. Rejecting the cynical trickery some people prefer in drama, his A.I. is equal to Kubrick's finest work." (NY Press, June 29, 2001)

A.I. is just one of those tests I use to separate the blind from the sighted. Spielberg's masterpiece deserved a review like this and the one it got from A.O. Scott in The New York Times. White goes Scott one better by placing Spielberg in a context most highbrows would find outrageous: For them," Ozu, Tarkosvsky, Spielberg" might as well be "Tolstoy, Joyce, Clancy."

6.

"In a perfect movie culture, Ousmane Sembène's Moolaadé would be a major story in such women's publications as Vogue, Cosmopolitan, Essence, Jane and Mademoiselle—who knows, maybe even the front page of the Times' Arts and Leisure. But as our film and media culture operates, the American institutions of female empowerment will not bother with the issues raised by Sembène.

Moolaadé follows, with everyday matter-of-factness, the story of Collé (Fatoumata Coulibaly), a Senegalese woman who opposes the traditions in her society that restrict the role—even the voices and sexuality—of women. Shouldn't this matter? Unfortunately, the only female experiences that American feminist critics and journalists attend to are those represented by middle-class and primarily white women. This problem isn't simply racism, but also the plain bad taste that automatically elects fraudulent, inhumane, anti-male filmmakers like Jane Campion and Catherine Breillat as standard bearers; thus leaving serious, world-class artists like Sembène ignored." ("Miss the Right Thing,"NY Press, October 12, 2004)

A typical bold-stroke indictment of a whole political group that seems unfair at first glance. But invite your Ivy League feminist intellectual friend over to watch Ice Cube's The Player's Club or Two Can Play That Game (two films White cites in this review) and peep her reaction.

5.

"'It is man that we need. A look caught with surprise can be sublime.' That's Robert Bresson quoted in Babette Mangolte's The Models of Pickpocket (showing at Anthology Film Archives), a documentary exploring the mystery of Bresson's art by interviewing the performers of his 1959 film Pickpocket 43 years later. Mangolte investigates the processes that made Bresson's films distinctive, but her inquiry into the phenomenon of film acting is a pop-art coup. It dovetails with Bernie Mac's remarkable performance in Mr. 3000. Comic-turned-actor Mac intuitively and instructively reveals a mutual sensitivity to the dilemma of a public figure fighting for his place in history. With Pickpocket, Bresson gave its principal actors Pierre Leymarie, Marika Green and Martin Lasalle a form of immortality. First called "interpreters," then "models," they all feel that their lives were changed by working with "Monsieur Bresson." Leymarie carries the memory into his work as a genetics researcher, Green became a professional actress and Lasalle pursued various career options as actor, painter, gardener, always haunted by Bresson's influence. Each performer admits how they "gave" themselves to Bresson. Years later they understood his dictum, "When the model is free of all intentionality, his expressiveness is adequate for the filmmaker." This is not just a high-art command; one gorges on the honest and authentic humor of Mac's characterization." ("The Black Natural,"NY Press, September 14, 2004)

Bernie Mac is the one-man answer to virtually all of Ho'wood's problems, but aside from Mr. 3000 director Charles Stone III, few in showbiz really see this man's potential. How else to account for his wallpaper status in three Ocean's movies? His TV show was cute, but Mac belongs on the big screen, front and center. Tough, nimble and symphonic in his range of expression, he deserves a comparable range of roles. Articles like "The Black Natural" force me to put away the blinders that make us automatically reject popular entertainers like Mac, Cuba Gooding Jr. and Tyler Perry as complicated—that word again—artists.

4.

"This pseudo-Third World indie [Maria Full of Grace] is actually full of crap. An anti-Homeland Security tearjerker, the story of a Colombian supermodel type puts a twist on illegal immigration. New motto: Give me your bored and materialistic—especially if they have no gag reflex. James L. Brooks' Spanglish exposes all that nonsense "humanism" with an immigration and integration story that honestly questions the values of L.A.'s soft-headed and wrongheaded liberals. His complex view of family love and social commitment shows the difference between compassion and condescension. Funny and remarkable." ("Dirty Dozens,"NY Press, December 28, 2004)

This hit job on Maria Full of Grace indirectly explains why "pseudo-Third World" indies like Amores Perros, Y tu Mama Tambien and City of God astonish with their cinematography but are about as revolutionary as a Banana Republic ad.

3.

"Combining a pop-culture echo chamber and Oedipal fun house, the mind of Wes Anderson is fixated on adolescent nostalgia. That's his charm. It's a vision that also strikes chords of longing that resonate in the now-complicated parts of your adulthood. That's his depth. Because Anderson can put this paradox on the screen—with funny characters, irresistible music and ebullient images—he stands as the most playful and poignant of the American Eccentrics. His flamboyantly titled new film The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou beats this year's good work by Alexander Payne (Sideways) and David O. Russell (I Heart Huckabees) for sheer effervescence. It is the most idiosyncratic, intimate and appealing of the bunch.

"This is Anderson's big one—his 8 1/2 and his Moby Dick. The problems of power, fame, creative freedom and domestic upheaval that perplex celebrated filmmakers once they arrive at a place of eminence and choice are addressed through the career of Steve Zissou, an oceanographer-filmmaker (played by Bill Murray). The Eccentrics don't like to admit their privilege; it's part of the middle-class advantage most filmmakers enjoy. But that awareness saturates every opulent, comic frame of The Life Aquatic. Anderson doesn't take privilege for granted; he basks in it, scrutinizes it." ("Yellowy Submarine,"NY Press, December 7, 2004)

Condescension works both ways—up and down. I've battled a personal prejudice against rich/middle-class kids all my life. Spoiled, self-absorbed, decadent and weak, goes the stereotype. As an adult, I've met some real ones who seem to have problems I could identify with. Imagine that. It's so cool that White, a son of old school, working-class Detroit, could develop the sensitivity to distinguish between the hollow falsity of American movies that claim to ignore class barriers (but really just ignore the underclass) and the transcendence of filmmakers like Anderson, who sing that nobody can help what they're born into; that most of us mean well; that affluence earned or inherited weighs upon the soul as heavily as poverty. Why is this important? See #10.

2.

"Certainly America needs some Black film critics—not a moonlighting Ivy Leaguer prof with the right bloodlines, a rock-n-roll refugee with a credible hairdo, or even an ax-grinding freelancer but someone (this may sound radical) who knows film. That's never been a high priority in the media, but nothing beats it. What too often replaces knowledge is a parochialism (critics trapped in their own backyards) and hack journalists ready to buy whatever's being sold.

"Reviewers don't need to be omniscient—sensitivity will do. But that's not guaranteed by race either. It's an ongoing emotional and intellectual process that can make a Daily News review more perceptive about Chameleon Street than any of the Black monthlies, or that makes The City Sun and The New York Times celebrate the 1986 Brixton comedy Black Joy when most other reviewers in town look away, consigning a remarkable film on diaspora culture to the land Hollywood forgot. Given this record, a generation of new Black filmmakers badly needs a generation of film reviewers who are not enslaved to Hollywood orthodoxy... If there are filmmakers with the guts or inspiration to put a frame around their individual view of the world, like Wendell Harris, or attempt creating their own syntax like Julie Dash with Daughters of the Dust, it may require a compatible critic who has a cultural head start to accurately describe the effort. This is too crucial a period in American cultural history to be left to fools." ("A New Wave Ebbs," The Village Voice, June, 1991)

I keep looking to the bottom of that article for a dotted line to sign my name in blood.

1.

"Does the Wayans family realize that the concept behind Little Man, their latest collective project, makes it a near-classic comedy? Director Keenen Ivory Wayans and his performing brothers Marlon and Shawn are notorious for childish impudence and sarcasm in such hits as Scary Movie and White Chicks. But in Little Man, dealing with their habitual irrepressible immaturity unleashes something poignant. It makes this silly, lightweight film almost deep." ("Knee High,"NY Press, July 19, 2006)

[...] them because I believe them.” And he is not without his supporters; check out House contributor Steven Boone’s celebratory profile. More common are the agnostics who abstain from passing judgment on White’s sincerity but object [...]Posted by Hating the Player, Losing the Game: The Armond Whi on 2010-07-07 00:28:24

You bring up White's excellent point about the Shaft remake and then say that you wish you could get Tarantino and some other filmmakers to heed it. Now, Tarantino certainly used a surface level gleaning of blaxploitation in Pulp Fiction and maybe Death Proof and Reservoir Dogs in esoteric senses, but I think Jackie Brown is everything White wanted from his idea of a new Shaft film. It's all about the typical Pam Grier character 20 years later, with her unsure of what she has to offer anymore and reflective on where her life went wrong.Posted by Jake on 2009-08-26 22:12:28

Armond White may be the Robert Christgau of cinema writing, in essence if not in the particulars - he's a lousy critic of media in an objective sense, but often does a bang-up job of summarizing the problems with society in more general terms, with some fine writing to boot.

Still, he opens nearly every negative review by comparing the film to something insipid and trite, something he claims does the work of the film far better than the film itself. An example (made up by myself):

In a positive review he does the opposite - his review of Coraline was essentially a demonization of Wall-E.

As a critic AW is too cautious to build up a model of what he considers to be quality, so it's impossible to hold him to any sort of standard. He'll attack a movie for lacking a moral core and then celebrate another with no morality for being some sort of meta-parody on our society. Like most contrarian critics he hates or loves a movie based on highly specific, seemingly unpredictable criteria, which makes him impossible to please reliably but (big surprise!) makes him interesting enough for people to keep reading (and get upset by) again and again and again.Posted by Clumpy on 2009-08-16 20:53:45

why didn't you simply title this "armond white makes my opinions for me?"

city of god - about as original as a banana republic commercial. the antidote: more bernie mac and tyler perry movies. hyachachachaPosted by phil on 2009-02-17 19:05:00

Nicely said, and quoted. Came by this site by accident, thanks for this happy accident.Posted by Katie on 2008-10-20 23:34:00

Folks,

For those interested, there is a blog that covers the Armond White book, "The Resistance: Ten Years of Pop Culture That Shook The World".

While I suspect that most readers of this page are familiar with that book, those who haven't heard of the book should know that it is a collection of Armond White essays covering the years 1984-1994.

As the title suggests, Armond White (in his inimitable style) attempts to make sense of the developments in film, music and the theater during those years.

Anyway, here's the link to the blog,

http://www.armondwhitebook.wordpress.com

Hopefully the blog can stimulate some dialogue amongst readers/fans of the book.

-WJPosted by Wow Jones on 2008-08-16 18:11:00

Great post, and the usual great discussion here at THND. When it comes to White, Iâ€™m reminded of my 8th-grade poli-sci teacher who talked about encountering a Congressman while out running: â€œI voted for you,â€ he told him. â€œI donâ€™t always agree with your decisions, but I trust that you do what you think is right.â€ When I read White, I find I donâ€™t have that same trust. Clearly others who have posted here feel the same, hence that common notion that heâ€™s contrarian for the purpose of being contrarian.

Look, I think we can all agree that thereâ€™s a segment of Whiteâ€™s hate-mail base thatâ€™s simple-minded and wants the Entertainment Tonight version of â€œcriticismâ€ â€“ a critic they can count on to agree with them most of the time and to use kid gloves in disagreement. And there are others who are simply uncomfortable with having their ideologies challenged. But for the rest of us who look at films (and life) more thoughtfully, I think we just want critics who approach their criticism honestly and openly, and with â€œsensitivity,â€ to use Whiteâ€™s words. Somehow, in my gut, I just donâ€™t believe thatâ€™s the way he approaches criticism.

I hesitate to use this comparison â€“ honestly, Iâ€™ve paused at the keyboard for a good three minutes, but what the hell â€“ it reminds me of when I force myself to watch Bill Oâ€™Reilly: What offends me most about that blowhard isnâ€™t what he says (hey, everyone has a right to an opinion), itâ€™s that I donâ€™t believe itâ€™s genuine. I think Oâ€™Reilly knows that he spins and contorts and spews propaganda. Itâ€™s his disingenuousness that makes me want to vomit.

That said, I canâ€™t get into Whiteâ€™s head. So what do I know? Itâ€™s just a gut feeling. Often his reviews make me think or give me a fresh perspective. And I appreciate that. So on top of Jimâ€™s question about whether bullying is an acceptable form of film criticism, thereâ€™s also this: Is playing Devilâ€™s Advocate acceptable? Part of me says, â€œSo what if White is sometimes full of shit and knows it!â€ Diversity of opinion is priceless and if his reviews challenge me, thatâ€™s good, right? Debate competitions donâ€™t require teams to actually believe the points they argue. They just need to be able to argue them. So maybe it doesnâ€™t matter if White is sensitive or whether he even believes in the arguments he makes.

But while a regular theme here at THND is a desire to see film criticism expand beyond plot review and evidence-free adjective-dropping, I donâ€™t want to see criticism lose its heart. Films can and in many cases should be analyzed scientifically. But I still go to the cinema to be moved, one way or another. And so I want a critic who watches movies for the same reasons (feel with the heart first, then go to the head to figure out those feelings). With White, I doubt thatâ€™s the way he operates. Sorry for the ramble.Posted by Hilts on 2007-12-14 00:38:00

one of the problems with white's current film criticism (next to that glide off into politically reactionary views) is his apodictic procedure.in other words: a director, who is once placed on his shit-list - like david fincher - has no chance, whatever he does.a blind man can see, that fincher has tried something new with "zodiac" (his most subtle film yet). but white is not willing to include it, because it doesn't fit in his monolithic scheme:Posted by Varrick on 2007-12-13 16:17:00

Kevin: "Yoda Kael" hahaha

One editorial mistake I made in the other article was to indicate emphasis mostly using exclamation points instead of italics. This sometimes makes it sound like we were shouting at each other (in the Barnes & Noble cafe!) when it was actually just mellow chitchat. Other times it appears that I'm cowering like Wendy Torrance to White's Jack. Ah, well, whatever sells-- wait, shit, I got nothing to sell.Posted by Steven Boone on 2007-12-12 05:24:00

Is bullying an acceptable form of film criticism?Posted by jim emerson on 2007-12-12 00:16:00

I think I really like (and sometimes hate) Armond White as a critic because he infuriates me. He's a contrarian at heart. His passionate, kneejerk reactions are as repelling as they are provoking.

Exhibit A (excerpted from Steven Boone's post):

"Unfortunately, the only female experiences that American feminist critics and journalists attend to are those represented by middle-class and primarily white women. This problem isn't simply racism, but also the plain bad taste that automatically elects fraudulent, inhumane, anti-male filmmakers like Jane Campion and Catherine Breillat as standard bearers; thus leaving serious, world-class artists like Sembene ignored."

My own kneejerk rebuttal: As a woman of color, I do feel that the feminist movement has largely been about white middle class women. I mean, let's face it - the movement started with frustrated housewives who were sick of the domestic sphere (The Feminine Mystique).

But this is where I diverge from White. White doesn't seem to understand the problems boiling within the (fragmented) third-wave feminist movement. He doesn't understand that inside this circle, there are people like me, born from Third World stock, who are sick and tired of the movement neglecting Third World misogyny and sexism, in the name of "multiculturalism". It's a touchy issue, mired in shades of grey. At the very least, I only wish that influential people like White would not clump all feminists under one category. It's unfair and reductive.

btw, I love Campion and Breillat's works. I find their bold and brash displays of female sexuality refreshing. I also love Trinh T. Minh-ha, an ethnic minority filmmaker White has lavished praise. I think I should be allowed to like a variety of women filmmakers. I am an individual, just like anyone else. Race is among one of my many partial identities - it is not the only one.

In short, I like White because he makes me think... for better or for worse.Posted by Tram on 2007-12-11 22:18:00

Interesting. This is probably the closest to a "best of Armond" we'll get to. It's also an object lesson in the troublesome task of distinguishing between revolutionary and reactionary thinking.

Good or bad, he's definitely *something*. The only time I've met Armond was when he presented Dreyer's MIKKAEL at what's now called the MOMI a few years back, right around when FAR FROM HEAVEN was released. I think he meant it as a rebuttal on what makes a good melodrama, since every other line he uttered was a dis on Haynes. He was surprisingly soft-spoken when we talked. The way Steven's transcript read its sounded like he was interviewing Sam L. Jackson in the role of Yoda Kael.

Love him or hate him, when faced with the prospect of White's absence, I can't help but think of what Shawn Kemp said in the locker room before the first NBA All Star game in many years that did not involve Charles Barkley: "Man, it sure is quiet around here."Posted by alsolikelife on 2007-12-11 19:10:00

"BUT, Ed Howard: "The mind boggles at how he got from Bresson to Bernie Mac in the space of one paragraph." No, you've got me all wrong there -- I don't even like Bresson all that much. Even so, the comparison didn't work for me. Presumably, there are good reasons why one might want to bring up Bresson in relation to Bernie Mac, but White never deigns to tell us what those might be. As it is, it seems random, poorly defined, and like the kind of choice made solely to piss people off. I can see White sitting at his keyboard, chuckling at all the cinephiles he's going to annoy by namedropping Bresson in a review of Mr. 3000. It's the positive version of the way he keeps dropping Spielberg at random into every negative review -- he loves to tout Spielberg as the all-purpose opposition to all kinds of art films that are entirely unrelated and distinct, just as he makes no effort here to draw a meaningful connection between Mac and Bresson. It's all done just to provoke.Posted by Ed Howard on 2007-12-11 12:56:00

anon: I have a strange sense of humor that sometimes doesn't come off in print. When I screamed, "I'm depressed" and "that hurts me!" like a drama queen, I figure Mr. White knew better. We were both grinning. I was dramatizing/satirizing how I and any resolutely shoestringy filmmaker would feel about his dismissal. But I was neither hurt nor depressed. I was charged up.

That's why I kept circling back to (and expanding upon) the question to see if he would budge. Rope-a-dope. It became clear that the only truly appropriate rebuttal to White's disregard for my kind of filmmaking... is a good film. Soon enough, I'll make my witness.

My defense for praising-not-burying White is laid out in these two articles, so I'll let them stand as a rebuttal for most of the responses here.

BUT, Ed Howard: "The mind boggles at how he got from Bresson to Bernie Mac in the space of one paragraph." Now, the tricky part is, White refers to certain favored artists as if they're up on Mount Olympus, too. We all do at times. The question is, how much canonization and prioritization falls along racial, class and nationalistic lines? That's a problem for all of us eggheads, something that White occasionally owns up to but almost always makes clear, even when he's pointing the finger at you.

I don't need a film critic to be smooth and tactful so much as useful. For the work I've set for myself, I need tools and weapons, sharp ones; a lot of you guys are fixated upon the fires that forged them rather than their utility.Posted by Steven Boone on 2007-12-11 07:59:00

Boone, if you allow yourself to be dissuaded from making a film by White's fusty thinking, that will be regrettable. Grab that digital camera and make the damn film. White is an arbiter of nothing, as far as I am concerned. He is not at all as visually astute as he seems to believe himself to be.

"Poor people have better things to do." Filmmaking is closed to you unless you become middle class and go for it. What the fuck??!! Should White excoriate your finished work, so what? Think of the fine company you'll be in.Posted by Anonymous on 2007-12-11 04:15:00

"The way the media and academia join Lee's annual bandwagons prevent notice of any less media-canny artist from affecting public discussion. And this is the degenerating effect of money and power: to preserve the status quo, to keep racial and political discussion in the control of the major studios and media outlets."

Change racial to some concept of conservative "American" values and I fail to see how White can blindly love Spielberg at the same time.Posted by Willy on 2007-12-11 04:12:00

The mind boggles at how he got from Bresson to Bernie Mac in the space of one paragraph.

White is pretty much predictably a barometer for the exact opposite of my own taste, so I usually read him with chagrin, shaking my head all the while. It's not just that he usually loves movies I hate and hates movies I love, but that his critical reasoning in both cases is often so thin and polemical. He has patches of genuine insight, and most of these quotes admittedly seem to be the cream of the crop as far as his writing goes, but the rest of the time it just seems like he's being inflammatory and difficult just for its own sake.

I also get a kick out of the way he flogs his Spielberg adulation endlessly, using Spielberg as an all-purpose comparison to all kinds of directors, all of whom supposedly pale in comparison to the genius of War of the Worlds or The Terminal. Off the top of my head, I remember shockingly inappropriate comparisons in reviews of Haneke, Guy Maddin, and Cronenberg. This kind of stuff indicates a mind that's just looking to provoke and promote his own outlook, rather than actually drawing meaningful connections.Posted by Ed Howard on 2007-12-11 03:28:00

I've always fallen on the "love him" side of AW, mainly because when he's right, he's freakin' dead on (that Cate Blanchett quote being exhibit A).

What I like about this interview is that it shows that while White does hold film to self-determined standards, they're really standards that he interprets the medium as achieving, rather than just a result of his political or aesthetic taste. He might be deluding himself, but at least he's trying...Posted by Brad LaBonte on 2007-12-10 22:44:00

steven: Perfect conclusion. If there's a theme here (and in Part I of your interview) it's White's tendency to confuse the art with the artist, or a single film with a body of work. Who knows how White gets from "The Darjeeling Limited" to the mandatory imprisonment of Sidney Lumet (hyperbolic nonsense... but quotable!). If White were to be judged by one paragraph from his writing instead of another, he could be dismissed as a discerning critic or a raving crank. Just depends on what paragraph you choose. (BTW, his review of "No Country For Old Men" understands how the movie works better than most; for example: "The entire movie becomes a stakeout, but with parts of the story deliberately dropped-outâ€”acknowledging what is unpredictable and unknowable in life.")

Anyway, I hope what AW was attempting to convey about technology is that it's like a pencil (or perhaps a lot of pencils) -- a tool for expression, but not the expression itself. So, don't be discouraged. The truth is, a self-contained consumer video camera is a HUGE leap in affordability and flexibility over 8 mm or 16 mm (especially when it comes to editing and tweaking the material after shooting). The technology isn't necessarily going to make the film any better or worse, but it has allowed new kinds of films to be made ("Tarnation," "The Target Shoots First," "51 Birch Street") -- films that could or would never have been made before...Posted by jim emerson on 2007-12-10 21:59:00

Just to prove a point to myself, I read a recent AW review to look for the telltale mark of preening contrariness, and sure enough, in his review of Todd Haynes' "I'm Not There," White goes after the one part of the film that every other critic has admired, Cate Blanchett's performance:

"Plus, itâ€™s sheer hell watching another Cate Blanchett character assassination. Her idea of Dylan is to dither, pivot and flutter her fingers while wearing a Harpo Marx wig."

The problem with White, among other things, isn't that Blanchett (or anyone else) should be above criticism, or that a critic should bow to critical consensus, but rather that it's so predictable that White, given a film whose flaws are so obvious, would find a way to suggest that all those other critics, though they were right to dislike the film, were still too stupid to get their criticism right. It's not courage, it's resentment.Posted by daniel on 2007-12-10 21:48:00

Armond is a pure Paulette, no "mentoring" by Andrew Sarris involved. I'll never forget hearing him on the Leonard Lopate show, when Georgia Brown, then of the Village Voice, confronted him over an outragous claim that Armond had made about her (and which is reprinted in his collection), to the effect that she had written in the Voice (!) that "black people should not be allowed to make movies." Of course, he couldn't cite any actual passage remotely saying that, but instead of admitting he was wrong (and race-baiting while he was at it), he barked back, "It's not my job to point out your sins to you," or something equally belligerent. Lately, he's been taking it out on Georgia's son, the director Noah Baumbach, suggesting among other things that Georgia "should have had an abortion." That's some real thoughtful, first-rate criticism there, huh?Posted by Matthew Arnold on 2007-12-10 18:51:00

A great piece, but really, no appreciation of Armond is complete without examples of him plotzing for subpar Robert Altman and Walter Hill movies. [Insert emoticon here]. Seriously, though, I think Armond is pretty fantastic, especially when it comes to his in-depth readings of mainstream African-American movies (he's particularly astute on Eddie Murphy's "Nutty Professor"s), but I think he does himself few favors by continuing to insist than anyone who disagrees with him is a philistine.Posted by Andrew Johnston on 2007-12-10 18:19:00

Adam, thanks for that Norbit link. I had never read that one. That there's a textbook example of how complicated the business of Armond-parsing really is: for an illustration of the kind of foul culture he derides, I used a movie he actually loves. Eddie Murphy has been on and off White's shit list across three decades. He's really taking it film by film, which is what I strive to do as a critic.

Because of this year's critical bandwagon for the lost Burnett films Killer of Sheep and My Brother's Wedding, I also felt the need to remind people of Chameleon Street. You can't champion Charles Burnett as a poet of the Black underclass without you've given Wendell B. Harris his propers.

K.U.: In bowing, I hit my forehead on yours.Posted by Steven Boone on 2007-12-10 17:07:00

My aversion to White, who I read rather religiously, in a love-to-hate sort of way, for the few years I was living in NYC, came from the sense that his responses to movies were rarely authentic.

I never bought that he was able to experience movies intuitively, viscerally; he was too burdened by his (admirably interesting and idiosyncratic) politics, by his loyalty to the legacy of Pauline Kael, by his desire to be contrarian, etc.

He's smart, no doubt, and those quotations of his that you cited, Steven, are good enough to make me reconsider some of my hostility to White as a critics, but still, for me, he just got too many films disastrously wrong for me to think of him as a great film critic, much less an artist.Posted by Daniel on 2007-12-10 17:04:00

You're welcome Steve. And thanks to you for your hard work on this and the interview (can't wait for Part 2!). I think you really proved yourself a formidable converser on the latter -- both you and Armond come off as distinct individuals with strong, deeply rooted points of view. No sycophants here. I'm impressed and humbled. You've both given me a bar to strive for and live up to.Posted by Keith Uhlich on 2007-12-10 15:18:00

SB:

I concede that "Norbit nihilism rules the day." By the way, have you read AW on Norbit?

http://www.nypress.com/20/7/film/ArmondWhite.cfm

...

I was really amused to note that the (excellent) new DVD of Killer of Sheep features a quote from Liza Schwarzbaum on the jacket and contains liner notes written by Armond White; they were at each others' throats during the famed Academy screener imbroglio, and one imagines that LS is precisely the sort of lazy-superlative-hurling (and white) critic AW is railing against in his Killer of Sheep essay.Posted by Adam N on 2007-12-10 14:47:00

Special thanks to editor Keith Uhlich for loaning me his brilliantly highlighted and annotated copy of White's book, The Resistance: Tne Years of Pop Culture that Shook the World. Every copy should come like that.Posted by Steven Boone on 2007-12-10 14:45:00